Stylus cleaning advice.

clean your brush too. i cleaned my stylus a few weeks ago, record sounded awful, tried again, cleaning both record and stylus, record still sounded awful, then I looked at my brush, and noticed, oh that's why. i just use a cheap dry brush, it's worked for me so far.

 

Bingo. I use the AT fluid on AT carts only. Anything else, dry brush or Zerodust unless the maker says otherwise.

 

I'm a magic eraser guy, the plain white version do not use the one with added cleaner. Yes even on the cart in my avatar I use ME.....Up and down motion ONLY and it removes all the fuzzies and stuff, leaves the stylus super clean. With a jewelers loupe I can see thru the diamond the ME cleans it so well.
I use the Lyra liquid maybe once a month, I don't like liquid on the cantilever.

I've never had any issues with my process on any cartridge.

 

I use a Signet vibrating gizmo when a simple stylus brush won't remove buildup. I forget the name of the device but it works very well to clean the stylus.

 

Since you and I seem to be on the same page, you might give the BluTak a go- i think it does a better job than the ME, and doesn't seem to create any more risk if you are careful.

 

I've always used the Discwasher stylus brush. Has done an excellent job, with no risk of damage (if used correctly).



I would be very wary of using BluTak - the greater adhesive properties (compared to the gels) has resulted in reports of some styli being removed from the cantilever.

 

Interesting on the BluTak risk-Peter Ledermann, from Soundsmith, had advocated it, i assumed (perhaps wrongly) that he wouldn't do so if it created some risk of damage. Haven't talked to him in a while, perhaps I should.

 

I'll agree that I prefer dry cleaning but if a stylus has been neglected, liquid can help.

That said, I hang mostly on another forum and have seen a few instances of people asking for help when the arm just skates across the record. It turns out the stylus had fallen off of the cantilever. In all instances, the poster had used a liquid cleaner on an Ortofon stylus.

So never use liquid cleaners on an Ortofon stylus.

 

IMHO the magic eraser is the best stylus cleaner. I've been using it for years with no issues.

 

I doubt that Pickering has been getting a lot of memo's lately?

 

I have also utilized the Discwasher unit you reference for decades with excellent results.

 

There was a thread about it. In a nutshell, i used it once and my stylus got damaged. After being convinced by so many that it couldnt have been the zerodust i tried it again.....and it damaged my new stylus. Never again

 

Plain white Magic Eraser for me too. Don't get creative - a couple of straight down drops is all that's needed (no brushing back to front - you'll snag the stylus). In the UK I use the Flash brand - about £1 for months and months of cleaning.

 

From Zu Audio's spec sheet for their hot-rodded Denon DL103 (from their website)

"Lots of good stuff to use: Needle Nectar, Onzo Zerodust, Musical Surroundings, LAST, Mo-Fi, Mr. Clean Magic Eraser, and yes, in a pinch you can go right ahead and lick your stylus clean, yep with your tongue—just the stylus. Whatever, don’t let anything on to or past the damper (little blue band thing). Most solvents degrade the damper and long brush nap are likely to break your coils or coil leads."

 

I wonder if MM and MC styli taste different.

 

When I bought my first bottle of Last Stylus Cleaner they included a Last badged carbon fiber brush which I still use before a swipe or two of the Last Stylus cleaner using the built into the cap brush. Haven’t ruined any cartridges using that and it cleans like crazy. This year I bought my first bottle of Stylast preservative and I’ll use one swipe of it after cleaning.

 

I know that all mfgs only recommend when using a brush to do the back to front motion. I always felt that motion might also, over a long period of time, pull or loosen the cantilever from its suspension. Especially if your brush bristles are stiff......I always prefer the up and down procedure.
The supplied Lyra red brush, the bristles are very stiff.

 

I don't think moving a styli through flexible bristles front to back would present anywhere near the forces exerted front to back from a styli tracking the turbulent groove in a record surface.

 

I tried everything and eventually caved to buying an RCM (cheapest one is Record Doctor) it has kept gunk from building up on the stylus.

I clean all records that come into my collection.
I then put them in MoFi plastic inner sleeves.
I don’t clean them every time I play them. If they have been around a bit then they get a cleaning, which i can usually tell by the surface.
I use record time cleaning fluid, which has no alcohol, distilled water and some sort of enzyme.
Alcohol is bad for records.
I wouldn’t use a liquid stylus cleaner, when a cleaning is needed which happens occasionally even with RCM in use, I use a Zerodust.

 

The magic eraser is good too!

 

I used many times a Thorens liquid cleaner in both my Ortofon 2M stily. I guess I was lucky that I hadn't damaged them and will avoid it from now on.

 

Wow, I'm going to bust in here and offer my experience but I warn people to be very careful, which is all that is needed, just be careful. IMO the Magic Eraser IS without question the way to get your stylus really clean. The heat and friction burns that crud on your stylus and from what I have experienced using the Magic Eraser, the suggested "dip into the eraser vertically" is somewhat worthless, you have virtually NO cleaning action with burned on crud on your stylus when dipping the stylus into the eraser. That motion never cleaned anything off my Shure V15 Type V-MR stylus, zero! You have to "carefully" drag a small piece lightly across the stylus from back to front, not once, but several times, and if you carefully do this, it WILL clean your stylus completely and it will look like a shiny new diamond. I always finished with a wet rub and a final dry off, but the Magic Eraser will get the crud off, just be careful not to push your stylus up or down and you will find the eraser will drag across the stylus with no ill effects, I promise, and it will clean your stylus, again, IMO, the dipping process is worthless, it will not get the burned on crud off your stylus.

 

Doug Deacon was, to my knowledge, the first to advocate the use of the Magic Eraser. He describes both methods at length-- the dunking and the scraping- in a post on Audiogon back in around 2005 or so; it is repeated on Arthur Salvatore's site (i think Doug does some reviewing there).
The one key, which ever method you use, is to dry brush afterwards since the ME can leave dust particulates that you don't want clinging to the stylus- it is abrasive.

 

You are absolutely correct, which is why I have always used a touch of water on my stylus brush to pull the crud off, and I "carefully" dry the stylus as well. Three easy and painless steps and you have a bright shinny clean tip.

 

The vinyl can actually melt and plate onto the back of the stylus leaving a black deposit. This seems difficult to remove. Think I may try the ME drag method. Thanks